← How To Fail With Elizabeth Day
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- [00:00]
Richard Bacon
And it comes out the fax machine and I can see this. I think it said Blue Peter presenter is a cocaine snorting sneak. They were like, oh, no, Dr. Alex would be perfect for this. But he's on Love Island. I'm not worried he's getting off with people in a hot tub. Instead of saving my life, I still daydream a lot about stopping drinking. It's a very hard one because I like it so much, but it's caused me a lot of problems in my life.
- [00:25]
Elizabeth Day
This episode of how to Fail is brought to you by Dove Whole Body Deodorant. Hello and welcome to how to Fail with me, me, Elizabeth Day. This is the podcast that believes we don't all fail the same, but we do all fail. And it's about what we learn from it that counts. Before we get started on today's episode, please do remember to like, follow and subscribe because it really, really helps other people find the show.
- [00:54]
Richard Bacon
The best dancers from across the globe are about to join me for the audition of a lifetime.
- [01:00]
Elizabeth Day
ABC Mondays. Do they have what it takes to compete and be the Dancing with the Stars pro? I'm here to win.
- [01:07]
Richard Bacon
Nothing is gonna stop me.
- [01:08]
Elizabeth Day
Our star judges will decide.
- [01:10]
Richard Bacon
This is what hunger looks like.
- [01:11]
Elizabeth Day
It was 100% the wrong choice. Robert Irwin hosts.
- [01:15]
Richard Bacon
The next era of ballroom starts right here on Dancing with the Stars. The next Pro.
- [01:20]
Elizabeth Day
All new Mondays, 8, 7 Central on ABC. Next day on Hulu. This summer, Prime Video takes you back before Legally Blonde, before law school and into the world of Elle woods in high school. Set in 1995, this Gemini vegetarian knows except exactly who she is until her family moves from Bel Air to Seattle. Packed with iconic fashion, 90s nostalgia and a throwback soundtrack, Elle proves one law school was hard. High school was harder. From the world of Legally Blonde, watch Elle, a new original series only on Prime Video. Watch now. Richard Bacon is a broadcaster and producer who began his career making tea at BBC Radio Nottingham before graduating to a three year stint as news reporter, during which time he interviewed Nicole Kidman and covered a story on sunburnt pigs. In 1997, he landed a sought after job as a presenter on the flagship children's TV show Blue Peter, only for his contract to be terminated a year later following a tabloid reveal of his cocaine use, an incident he describes now as still making me feel ashamed. But Bacon rebuilt his career, going on to present hit radio and TV shows on both sides of the Atlantic. In 2023, he launched his own production company, yes yes Media, establishing himself as an inventive and influential TV format creator. The shows Bacon develops tend to be both smart and quirky, including Silence is Golden, in which comedians try to make an audience laugh and money is deducted from a prize pot every time anyone sniggers. This inventiveness is a product perhaps of his ADHD. Diagnosed at the age of 42, Bacon link his neurodivergence to his creativity and hyper focused idea generation. But it's also a symptom of his desire to find out just what makes us all tick, as evidenced by his latest project, a podcast, why are you more successful than me? In which Bacon interviews guests such as Gary Lineker, Alain de Botton, and, well, me about what really drives them. Success fascinates us all, Bacon says. I want to understand what it actually is and how it really happens. Richard Bacon, welcome to how to Fail.
- [03:47]
Richard Bacon
Thank you. What a wonderful introduction. Oh, well, it's thoughtful and I mean, my podcast, I just make one up after the event, but it's quite sort of interesting when somebody lays out your career like that.
- [04:00]
Elizabeth Day
Well, I felt bad about mentioning Blue Peter, but it is one of your failures, so then I felt okay about it because I do. I mean, we'll come onto it, but I really admire about you how you have such resilience and you own things and so much of your podcast is about that. Yeah, it's about owning your failure as well as your success.
- [04:22]
Richard Bacon
Definitely. And it's the Blue Peter thing is it has changed my entire career and therefore it's changed my entire life. Without that, I wouldn't be married to the person I'm married to. I wouldn't have the children I've got. I wouldn't live where I live. This career that you mentioned, where I try and invent TV shows, I wouldn't be doing that if that. I don't know what my life would be in that parallel universe, but every single thing would be different if that hadn't happened on Blue Peter. So to not talk about it would be. Doesn't make any sense.
- [04:53]
Elizabeth Day
Yes. I appreciate that you've chosen it. Thank you. What does success mean to you?
- [04:58]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, it's such a good question. And I think to me, I suppose at the age I'm at now, success is about. Have you kept it going? Can you keep it going? Do you still like it? Does it still satisfy you? I think professionally that's what it is to me.
- [05:12]
Elizabeth Day
Such a good answer. Oh, thanks. Why is your skin so online? Is this just genetics?
- [05:19]
Richard Bacon
Your skin is online. How old are you? You're younger.
- [05:21]
Elizabeth Day
Than me.
- [05:22]
Richard Bacon
Oh, only just.
- [05:23]
Elizabeth Day
I'm clinging on to the thing.
- [05:24]
Richard Bacon
You've got no lines. Well, have you had Botox?
- [05:27]
Elizabeth Day
Yeah. Yeah. Have you?
- [05:28]
Richard Bacon
No. Wow. Wow.
- [05:34]
Elizabeth Day
Drink a lot of water.
- [05:35]
Richard Bacon
You don't have children who drink a lot of water?
- [05:37]
Elizabeth Day
Yeah, children is quite aging.
- [05:39]
Richard Bacon
Yeah. And water is amazing for keeping you looking young. I. When I was. I think when I was on Blue Pizza, they brought in, for some reason, a skincare company. This is like. This is now 27 years ago, brought into moisturizer and. This sounds completely mad. No, they let me. They wanted me to test some and they brought me like five or six different ones and I used them and I. I enjoyed putting moisturizer on my face so much that I've done it about three times a day for 27 years.
- [06:04]
Elizabeth Day
Okay.
- [06:05]
Richard Bacon
I find it really satisfying. And so maybe there's a consequence to that that's positive because I. I drink too much alcohol and I've. I've. You know, I've led a life of. It's not always been the healthiest life, so it's surprising I don't look more like Keith Richards.
- [06:23]
Elizabeth Day
Well, that's a great addiction for you to have an addiction to moisturizer.
- [06:27]
Richard Bacon
Great, if that was the only one.
- [06:29]
Elizabeth Day
We'll come on to that, too. I'm fascinated by your parents.
- [06:32]
Richard Bacon
Oh, good.
- [06:33]
Elizabeth Day
Yeah. Your dad was a criminal defense lawyer and your mother was a nurse. She had a really difficult childhood.
- [06:40]
Richard Bacon
She did. She wasn't a nurse. She worked at my dad's law firm. But she.
- [06:42]
Elizabeth Day
No, that's on the Internet.
- [06:43]
Richard Bacon
Don't know, but it's. She. She worked at my dad's law firm when she was young. They are both really interesting. My dad now is very nearly blind and he's got a thing called retinitis pigmentosa, which takes away your peripheral vision. It's quite a cruel one. It's very slow, even. I mean, I remember my dad's 40th, and even then, if you put your hand out to shake his hand, he wouldn't know it was there. So I'd always have to say to him, oh, Steve, put his hand out and he would shake his hand and he would. He was. He wouldn't tell people about it for a long time. Now he's got a white stick now. I think he should get a guide dog. This has been a long process. He's got 2% vision in one eye and nothing in the other eye. So if you imagine, it's a very interesting thing. Retinitis pigmentosa. It's what took away Chris McCausland's site. You know the comedian.
- [07:29]
Elizabeth Day
Yes.
- [07:30]
Richard Bacon
But it's like looking, basically, if you imagine looking through a straw from one eye. That's how my dad sees the world. And a brilliant man and a kind man. My mom is fascinating, charismatic, an addict. Her dad was awful. She said she had a really complicated childhood where she just wanted stability and. And I think. I think the reason. Talk about success. I think the reason I now look at my mum as being a success is her. Her life growing up in a pub in a mining community called Bloodworth in Nottinghamshire was chaotic because Jack, her dad, was just not a good person at all and really a horrible person, which is a funny thing to say about your own granddad, but it's just true. And I think what she desired was to have a family instability. And so when I look at my mum and I think, okay, you had three kids, we're all close, they're still married. That, that is a great measure of success, I think, if you're her from that background and my dad is a criminal defense lawyer, he was involved. I mean, he was. He would. He had a small hand in Huntley's defense. I mean, it doesn't mean he thinks Ian Huntley, but it's part of the process of the law. There was a woman called Ruth Neave who was. She was accused of killing her son. And he got her off. And I remember when he got her off, he came home and when you're a defense lawyer, you're quite pleased, even if you've. I was following the case thinking, dad, I think you've got off a murderer who, who killed her own son. And he came home and he's in a good mood and he was celebrating. Cause that was his job. And I remember thinking, this is a weird job Dad's got. I think he's got a child murderer off. Years later, through DNA evidence, it turned out that she was innocent and he was right all along. But he's had hand in some really interesting criminal defense cases, including the wheelie bin murderer. Don't go thinking the wheelie bin murderer killed wheelie bins. He killed people and put them in wheelie bins. It's important, Elizabeth. It's an important distinction.
- [09:23]
Elizabeth Day
Clip this for social media. This is gonna get high engagement. Okay, good. It is important. How. How aware were you? I mean, it sounds like you were a little bit aware of his work, but with Ian Huntley, would he talk about that?
- [09:35]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, but he wasn't. He wasn't in Huntley's main defense he was just brought in. He knew very well, I think, the QC who was representing in Huntley, he was brought into the case and was there when a lot of it was happening. But I was aware we're from a town called Mansfield, which is quite high crime rates and when I was growing up, there's a point when it had, I think about the same murder rate as New York. Like it was. It was right around the time of the weenie bin burn. I don't know why I'm. This shouldn't be laughing, but. But around that time. And he's from a very working class family. He tells a story about him and his three brothers and his mum and dad one Christmas, going down to. I think it was one shilling, which I looked up and I think in today's money it was like 5p. So he was the only one of his family to go to university and. And they were very like new middle class, my parents, if you know what I mean by that.
- [10:20]
Elizabeth Day
Yes.
- [10:21]
Richard Bacon
And that was all very interesting. Like he got. He had a BMW with a private reg play, you know, he wanted the trappings of. I've come from a working class family and now I've got somewhere else. But his work was always interesting. It is. It is a branch of law that's endlessly fascinating. And he worked so hard. He still does some work, but he worked so hard. I mean, his work. I hope I work hard. His work ethic. The phone would go in the middle of the night and it would be someone who'd been arrested at Mansfield police station and he would run down there and represent them and it would wake us all up on school nights. But to him, any work that came his way, he would just automatically take it.
- [11:00]
Elizabeth Day
You never forget where you come from in that respect. Yeah, you, you are very clever. Do you feel that your intelligence has been valued or respected in the way
- [11:12]
Richard Bacon
that you might want it to be? An interesting question. I don't really know how to answer that because I don't. I don't know. I hope I'm clever. I think, yeah, I've got a fast moving brain. I've got a very ADHD brain. Do you know what? At school I was. I was confident, I wasn't particularly well behaved. I didn't work hard enough at it. And this funny thing, I didn't. In my house, we didn't read enough. And I remember kind of at school, like, my daughter's currently reads a bit slowly, she's getting better at it. And I remember thinking I was quite slow at reading. And then in my 20s, I was working on the Big Breakfast with people like Johnny Vaughan and all the people I worked with there, they were so clever. Johnny just seems to know every single fact in the whole world. Ed Forsdick, the late exec producer, had been to Oxford and I was surrounded by people with so much knowledge and I just started reading and reading and reading and I suddenly started reading quicker and. Whereas I think I would have assumed, knowing what I know now, that I was dyslexic at school. But I actually, I got over it. So I don't know how to explain what that was. And I read quick. And then when I was on 5 Live, I would. I did notice I could read something quick, taking the information and keep it all in my head and just use it straight away. And I did start to think, oh, maybe, you know, maybe I am quite intelligent, but I've never overly thought of myself that way.
- [12:29]
Elizabeth Day
Well, I think you're very intelligent. You have a very, very interesting mind.
- [12:33]
Richard Bacon
Oh, thank you.
- [12:37]
Elizabeth Day
A lot of people listening to this show have sat with something they've never told anyone. Not a mistake, not a bad decision. A thought that arrived uninvited and just kept coming back. That made them feel like there was something deeply wrong with them. And because it didn't look like a failure they could talk about, they just carried it in silence. For millions of people, that's not a character flaw, it's ocd. Not the organizing stereotype. Real OCD is persistent, unwanted, intrusive thoughts that latch onto the things you care about most, your relationships, your values, your sense of who you are and bring enormous guilt and shame with them. And the more you fight the thoughts, the louder they get. The good news is that OCD is highly treatable with the right kind of specialized therapy. OCD needs erp, or Exposure and Response prevention therapy, which has proven to be the most effective treatment. Regular talk therapy is, isn't recommended for OCD and can actually make it worse. And that's where NOCD comes in. NOCD is the world's leading provider of OCD treatment and it's covered by insurance for over 138 million Americans. All their licensed therapists specialise in ERP therapy and will help you learn to take the power away from intrusive thoughts in live, face to face virtual sessions. They also provide support between sessions when you need it most, so you're never facing OCD alone. If any of this sounds familiar, visit nocd.com to book a free 15 minute call with their team that's n o c d dot com. If you've been sitting on a business idea, Shopify makes it unbelievably easy to make it real. Everything you need to start selling is there from day one, including the moment someone is actually ready to buy from you. What surprised me early on was how smooth that first checkout felt. Shopify checkout helps more customers finish their purchase and when they come back, their details are already saved. One tap and they're done. It gave me this quiet confidence like, oh, this is actually happening. And because Shopify handles the setup and the checkout, you suddenly have the headspace to focus on growing the thing, the part that actually lights you up. That shift from setting up to building is such a turning point. With Shopify, nothing stands between your idea and a real business. So go make it one. Start your free trial at shopify.co.ukfail. your free trial at shopify.co dot UK fail. If you know me, you'll know I love reality TV. I find it's great escapism and just the best way to take my mind off work and chill out. My favourite thing to do after a particularly busy period is to position myself on the sofa with my lovely cat Huxley and watch the Real Housewives. Something that makes this ritual even more enticing is a Lola's blanket. It's crafted with ultra soft luxury faux fur and a signature four way stretch that sets it apart. What's more, it's machine washable, which is crucial with Huxley around. He does like to moult, bless him. Double hemmed for durability and stays flawless. No pilling, no shedding. Even after repeated washes, it actually elevates the space where other blankets might make a sofa or room feel scruffy. This makes my home feel cozy and curated. For a limited time, our listeners can get 40% off select Lola blankets products with code howtofail at checkout. Just head to lolablankets.com and use code howtofail to get 40% off your order. After your purchase, they'll ask where you heard about them. Please support our show and let them know we sent you. Wrap yourself in luxury with Lola blankets. Let's talk about your first failure.
- [16:25]
Richard Bacon
Yeah.
- [16:25]
Elizabeth Day
Being publicly fired from Blue Peter.
- [16:27]
Richard Bacon
Yeah.
- [16:28]
Elizabeth Day
After an expose in the News of the World for taking cocaine. Now, I didn't know this bit.
- [16:33]
Richard Bacon
The cocaine bit?
- [16:34]
Elizabeth Day
No, that I knew that bit. Don't worry.
- [16:35]
Richard Bacon
The News of the World bit?
- [16:36]
Elizabeth Day
No. That it was your best friend who told the story.
- [16:39]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, yeah. It Was I'd worked with him at Radio Nottingham and. Yeah, what happened was. Well, what happened was I took some cocaine.
- [16:49]
Elizabeth Day
Were you taking cocaine regularly?
- [16:51]
Richard Bacon
No, I had taken it before that. It is. Do you know what I noticed at the time? Other people got caught up in that. And, you know when you'd see other people get done for that and they'd always go, I didn't do this. And they always go, it was my first time. I remember thinking, really, really. The first time you ever took it happens to be the time you got caught. Rarely makes any kind of sense. First time I took it was in a nightclub called Browns in Covent Garden with that guy that you alluded to, whose name I'm not going to use, but. And we were best mates and he got a rap of it and I took the whole rap at once, which, you know, obviously I didn't really understand it and I threw up. But I had taken a handful of times before that. And he. I think he was jealous of me. So I did 20 months on blue Peter pretty much. Pretty much the same amount of time. Keir Starmer was Prime Minister, which is
- [17:45]
Elizabeth Day
now a long term these days.
- [17:48]
Richard Bacon
Much longer than Liz Truss.
- [17:49]
Elizabeth Day
Yes.
- [17:51]
Richard Bacon
And we went out and obviously I shouldn't have done that. Blue Peter was such a big opportunity and I. I loved the job and I still really respect it as. As a program. And you were in these massive studios and you were flying around the world. It was an incredible job to have at 21 to the age of 22. And we had a big night out and took a load of drugs and. And then I. Where was I? It was Blue Peter's 40th anniversary at the Natural History Museum and I came out and I came out with Karen Keating, who's now passed away, who I used to fancy so much when she was hosting Blue Peters or before I was a host myself. And I walked out of the Natural History Museum with her and Anthea Turner and there was a photographer there, paparazzi style photographer, and he was only taking pictures of me. And I said, well, that's weird because there's Anthea Turner and there's Karen Keating and there's me and he's. He's not. And I was like, they're there. And he was just. He wasn't interested. They followed me down the street and he followed me into a taxi. And so I was like that there's something not right here. Something's wrong. And I didn't know what it was. And I suppose in my mind I thought, shit, you know you sometimes take drugs and you shouldn't. The next morning, I called my agent, a guy called John Holmes, really legendary agent, and he was working with a recent former editor of the sun called Stuart Higgins. And he was doing PR for all of John's clients. He had some really good clients, like Gary Lineker and People. And so he'd hired a good PR guy. And I said, look, John, something weird's happened. So he got Stuart Higgins to call me, and. And I said, stuart, I don't get it. And he went, okay. And it was. And by now it's Saturday morning. And he went. He went, okay. He says. He said, let me do some digging. I'll start with the News of the World. I know the editor. I'll call him. I went, okay. I didn't. Obviously, I'm not expecting him to come back and go, oh, yeah, it's the News of the World. And my dad. And remember, he was a criminal defense lawyer, and this taking cocaine is about breaking the law. And he was at my little flat in Chiswick, which he since bought off me and still owns side detail. Elizabeth. Not relevant to the story, but I always die for no marker of success,
- [20:04]
Elizabeth Day
though, given what we were talking about. Yes.
- [20:06]
Richard Bacon
And we were. We were decorating it. And so we went to B and Q just between Chiswick and it's not. You know, it's not B and Q, not Halfords, and it's gonna come home base. Oh, my God, it's home base. How did you do that?
- [20:22]
Elizabeth Day
I don't. I was just visualizing the Wandsworth roundabout, which used to have a home base on it now.
- [20:26]
Richard Bacon
Rips in peace.
- [20:28]
Elizabeth Day
Yeah.
- [20:29]
Richard Bacon
So I went to home base between Chiswick and Richmond with him to pick some paint for the living room of my flat in Chiswick. And we picked Midnight Mist.
- [20:37]
Elizabeth Day
Nice.
- [20:37]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, good choice. And then on the way back, I'm in the passenger seat, he's driving, when he could still drive. And my phone went. And it was Stuart Higgins. And I answered it, and I went, hi, Stuart, my dad's next to me. And he just went, it's News of the World. Cocaine and lots of it. That was the exact words. So I'm so like. And Dad's next to me. And I went, okay. Okay. All right, Stuart, I'm gonna call you back, okay? All right, see you in a bit. And my dad was like, who's that? I went, oh, yeah, no one. And went back to the flat. I was like, whoa, I'll have to tell him. And then he started painting the Wall with the midnight mist. And then I, I thought, oh dad, listen, I think I went outside to call Stuart back. What he meant by lots of it was lots of copy. As in it's going to be a big spread in the News of the World the next day. So I was like, fucking, I better tell him. And I sort of told him. He didn't quite understand it and I called my mum and they just couldn't really process it at the time. And. And so that night I was faxed a copy of it. God. Back in the days of a fax machine, I went around to Stuart Miles flat, near my flat. It was a Blue Peter presenter at the time. And it comes out the fax machine and I can see this, I think it said Blue Peter presenter is a cocaine snorting sneak. I think goody goody Blue Peter presenter is a cocaine snorting sneak. What sneak even means. And you can see it laid out. And I read it and Stuart Higgins had said to me, actually, let's just rewind before that, Stuart called me back and he said, he said, the person that's done this to you, you've spoken to them today. So this is the Saturday, right? So now we've done the. Oh, where's my dad? I've got the news. And after Stewart had called me, I'd called my best friend. Cause that's what you do. And I went, I'm in trouble. And he was like, oh my God, that's awful Twist in like a thriller. Stuart Higgins then says, whoever did this to you, you spoke to him today. And I was like, well, it's not my dad, is it? It's not the bloke who works at home Base who sold me Midnight Mist. It was like a twist. And I was. And so I thought, well, it's him. And I said to you, how do you know? And he said, because Stuart was so close to the editor at the time, he goes, because he's. The editors told me he's called him worried. He's called him worried. So, so that really went wrong for my friend in that sense. And so I didn't, I didn't call him back straight away. Obviously in time I let him know that I knew and then he denied it. But it was pointless denying it. I knew it was him. I'd found out because I happened to have a PR who'd recently edited the sun, who knew the editor of the News of the World. And that was, and so that was fascinating and really surprising. We really were best friends. I drove to the house of the editor of. Of Blue peter called Oliver McFarlane. Nice guy who gave me the job. And he was on this little housing estate. And I got there and then knocked on the door. I told him I was coming. It's only what for? His wife answered. She said, come in, Richard. And I sat in the living room with him and his wife, and they're such nice people. He. I think he went on to work in, like, BBC classical music. Very, kind of lovely, quite jolly BBC. Very, very good man. And I went. She brought me, like, a cup of tea and a cake. This is now late Saturday. And I went, look, got some bad news. I'm gonna be the News of the World tomorrow for taking cocaine. And she said, oh, everyone smokes that these days. And I thought, oh, she's got all the drugs confused. Either she means weed or crack, and nothing's correct. And so I was like, okay. I said, no. I said, I don't think they do. And I think it's really serious. And I think I'm, you know, you're gonna have to let me go. And then I was summoned to what was called East Tower, a television center which no longer exists. And I got in the lift to go and see Lorraine Hegassy, who was the head of Children's BBC. And I got in the lift with the head of hr just coincidentally, and she got my contract in her hand. And I was like, so you know what's coming? And I knew I'd have to go anyway because by now it's Sunday and it's in the paper. Back then, the. The Sunday newspapers used to come out first at King's Cross.
- [24:51]
Elizabeth Day
Yes.
- [24:51]
Richard Bacon
Do you know that? It's true, isn't it?
- [24:52]
Elizabeth Day
It is true. They. They would go to the main stations because then they'd be taken to other parts of the country.
- [24:58]
Richard Bacon
Yeah.
- [24:58]
Elizabeth Day
And so you could always get the first.
- [24:59]
Richard Bacon
That would be the reason that they were taken on the trains to other places. So, yes, it was quite well known. I mean, these days I barely read a newspaper. But back then I was very interested in them. I thought, yeah. So I drove to King's Cross to get the News of the World to see myself in it. And so, yeah, I went up, see Lorraine Hegassee, and, you know, I. I said, yeah, I've got to go. She said, you've got to go. Then I had to hand in my badge. It's like. It's like leaving the LAPD after handing your badge, your Blue Peter badge. I could no longer get in free to the Motor Museum. Yeah. I can get free to man two swords anymore.
- [25:28]
Elizabeth Day
But you've got a badge back.
- [25:29]
Richard Bacon
Got it, yeah.
- [25:30]
Elizabeth Day
The Blue Peter 620 years later or something.
- [25:32]
Richard Bacon
Yeah. In a sort of quite sweet circular thing.
- [25:34]
Elizabeth Day
Yeah.
- [25:34]
Richard Bacon
The 40th is where it all collapsed. And then I got invited back to the six. I got invited to the 60th and Peter Purvis in front of all the other Blue Peter presenters off camera. But he pinned one on me in front of and he said, all is forgiven. And all the other Blue Peter presenters applauded.
- [25:50]
Elizabeth Day
There's so much I want to ask you about this particular experience for you, but I also just want to salute Blue Peter for a bit.
- [25:55]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, do.
- [25:56]
Elizabeth Day
Because there'll be people watching or listening to this podcast who don't understand what cultural value it had, how important it was for us. I grew up with that show. I had a Blue Peter badge. It was my prized possession. I loved Janet Ellis, Simon Groom and Peter Duncan with the passion. It was the thing that my sister and I watched when we got back from school. It really shaped us as individuals. It got us into crafting and double sided sticky tape and it taught us so much. And it was such an iconic show. And I know it's still going, obviously I don't still watch it, but it carried such weight that when you lost your job, Lorraine Hegassy herself went on Blue Peter and announced was huge.
- [26:40]
Richard Bacon
It was huge. It was really treated in such a big way. And I know Lorraine, obviously, and I've seen her since. I mean, I find it a tiny bit questionable that one in hindsight. So it was between Newsround and Blue Peter. So Newsround was on at 5 till 10 past 5. Blue Peter started at 5, 10. And so on the Monday, the show was back and it was live and she decided to go on air herself from her office and make a statement like the Prime Minister during COVID or something like. It was quite strange. And I remember watching thinking, this is children's tv. They don't even know there's a head of children's tv. So she goes on tv, I'm the head. Like, it doesn't. You don't mean anything to them. And it was quite funny. But she, yes, she did. She said, Richard has not only let himself down, he's let all of you down badly. I remember. And I remember my mum really judging her going, she really obviously wants to be the center of attention, which if you know, my mum is sure. But it's the ultimate Christian. Oh, no, she likes that too.
- [27:43]
Elizabeth Day
Okay.
- [27:43]
Richard Bacon
But I don't it wouldn't be that big now. It's hard to understand why it was so big. It was. I was. I remember going to a place called Bell's park and I went to hiding because there was so many press outside that little flat. There's just so many photographers outside my house. Just so many. Like a Princess Diana or something. It was just like, why or what you're doing here. I had this car, strange car, and it was a convertible, but. And the, the. When you converted it, the roof went into this electronic boot. So it was quite a slow process. And I came out my house, I just do all these troubles everywhere and I had to put my bag in the boot and. And. But to open the boot, it would just open really slowly and I put the key in, it goes. It's just so slow. And they're all gathered around me and I'm like, speed up. And they're all throwing questions at me. I'm like, come on. Just getting open to squeeze the bag in. Once the bag's in, you turn the key, the other ring just really slowly. And I thought, I can't stay here. So I hid with a guy called Mitch, who was the voiceover artist on Live and Kicking. I was in the Fame. What was famous then? A pub called the Haverstock Arms. On the Wednesday or Thursday night of that week, Chris Evans, who I now know I didn't know them, was talking about me on Virgin Radio the whole time he invited me on TFI Friday. I mean, he talked about me like for the whole. Back when he was like that, the whole week he said things like, half the BBC are on drugs. Which he didn't really mean. But I was on his show recently, I reminded him of that statement and he looked nervous and I was with Chris Moyles, I was getting to know him, who wasn't even famous at the time. And we're in this place called the Haverstock Arms. Quite a show, busy pub at the time. But then someone said to me, they're talking about you on Question Time. And someone else went, andrew, who ran it, who was the barman from TFI Friday act ran the real pub. And he went, let's put it on. So we put it on and the whole pub stopped and watched Question Time and every time someone made a comment in my favor, the pub applauded. And every time someone said a comment against me, the pub booed. So John Redwood said I should go to prison and the whole pub went, ooh. So. And it actually became quite a weird cartoony surreal experience when John Redwood is
- [29:51]
Elizabeth Day
on the other side, you know you're doing something right.
- [29:53]
Richard Bacon
Exactly, yeah.
- [29:54]
Elizabeth Day
Tell me about your experiences of shame. I mean, it sounds like you had a good network around you where you were able to recalibrate quite quickly, which I think is an admirable quality. But the shame, I imagine, lingers for a long time.
- [30:11]
Richard Bacon
Well, the biggest shame about it, I can explain that quite simply, really, which is it was actually sometime later, I don't know how much time later, but my mum told me it was the only time that she'd heard my dad cry, ever. And he's just from that generation that doesn't. And I mean, his own dad came out of World War II, didn't show emotion. My dad doesn't know what he's like. And he cried. And it was on the Monday morning. So the News of the World comes out on a Sunday and this is now Monday morning. He's got to go to Court, where he works, as we've established. And he went into the shower to cry. So he went into the shower and then he turned on the shower so that she wouldn't hear him cry. So she. He didn't want her to know and she didn't tell me at the time. She left it quite a while, to be honest, but she said it's, you know, I mean, even to this day, it's the only time I've ever heard him cry. So when she told me that story, I felt a deep sense of shame.
- [31:03]
Elizabeth Day
How do you feel about that period of your life now? Because I'm aware that, you know, it's 28 years later, we're still talking about it. You do a great job of bringing it up, I think, before other people do.
- [31:15]
Richard Bacon
Yeah.
- [31:16]
Elizabeth Day
How do you think it's shaped you for good and for bad?
- [31:19]
Richard Bacon
It was quite a public humiliation. I was young, you know, so, yeah, I was actually still 22 when it happened. You know, I've been through a few other bad things. Some have been public and some that haven't. And I think I am quite resilient. I think that I can kind of. I think I've. I was aware at the time when that thing was happening, like there were points when it was awful and then it kind of became so cartoony in ways because of the Chris Evans and the Chris Moyles and the Question Time and all that stuff. There was a Blue Peter presenter producer who told me I'd never work in television again, which wasn't very helpful and not accurate. But there was a point when I thought I was aware consciously that I was dealing, this is a few days later. I was aware consciously that I was dealing with it quite well. I was like, okay, this is interesting. Almost like my internal dialogue. Okay, you've worked, you can see it, you've contextualized it, you've understood it. I was on top of it somehow. And that was interesting. And, you know, there were sad moments. I remember watching Blue Peter a few weeks later, just missing them all going, I wish I was still there.
- [32:31]
Elizabeth Day
Missing Karen Keating.
- [32:33]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, missing everyone from Blue Peter. I loved the job, it was a great job. But I, I, it made me quite resilient. So I think when I've been through other things that have been hard, I think I've got through them better because of what happened then. It is a young age to go through something that public and for it to, you know, from my mum and dad being both from working class backgrounds but being uni middle class and you know, getting a car with a number plate that's private reg and all that is, you know, they were very, very, very proud that their son was on Blue Peter because it's a very middle class show in its own right. And so it was a big deal, you know, in their heads. My mum was just walking around the supermarket telling people her son was on Blue Peter. So for them it was a big, big crash for that to come down. I got a job on the Big Breakfast about three months later where the host had been in prison for dealing cocaine. And it was a place that really taught me about ideas and it just really suited my brain and it changed the course. So it changed absolutely everything.
- [33:45]
Elizabeth Day
Did it leave you with trust issues after being betrayed by your friend?
- [33:50]
Richard Bacon
Maybe a bit. I mean, there was another guy actually who I was friendly with who was giving quotes about me to the newspaper I confronted. There was a bit of that going on. There was a bit of, what are you doing that for? Yes, I suppose did, but not as much as it should have done, I think, is how I describe it. Sometimes when you go through a trauma, it impacts you in ways that you can understand and it impacts you in ways you can't understand. But you do get yourself back to a place, once you're through it, where you, you feel the same as you did before it as in, I think we need to do that. Do you know what I mean by that? That when you, when you come outside of pain, you want to get back to your happy place and life to be like it was before. So I didn't have too much trust issues because I think as a young man I just, I wanted my life to get back to because I was happy before and I wanted to see the world in the same way. So maybe it didn't affect trust issues as much as it should have done. Right now get up to 15% off select storage solutions put heavy duty HDX totes to good use, protecting what's important to you. The solid impact resistant design prevents cracking and the clear base insides make items easy to find even when the totes are stacked. Find select shelving and tote storage up to 15% off at the Home Depot. To organize every room in your home from your garage to your attic, visit homedepot.com how doers get more done
- [35:20]
Elizabeth Day
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- [36:05]
Richard Bacon
That's true.
- [36:06]
Elizabeth Day
Due to visa issues.
- [36:07]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, that's true. You would think the visa issue was because of what happened on Blue Peter. It wasn't. I moved to America. My wife and I wanted to. We just wanted to live in Los Angeles for a bit. And it wasn't really well thought through that the, the moving to America thing. It was, it was just we wanted to do it and so I pitched a show to a network over there, BBC America, that was. There was going to be me interviewing celebrities who'd done really well in America in their favorite city. And they would take me on a tour of the city and as it got commissioned and I got that and I got another job over there, which was about. It was for a cable network and it was about going around the country talking to people who believe in UFOs, getting them drunk and telling them they're wrong. And it was like really funny idea. Literally, like they were like, you've got to get them drunk. I was like, this sounds amazing. It's like sort of Louis through John Ronson, but drunk. I thought, that's great. So I quit my job on 5 Live. And, and we, I rented my house out in London and rented a house in Los Angeles and Ricky Gervais was the first guest. And, and that phrase in TV rigged where you put loads of cameras somewhere. We were, he was going to take me from his apartment in a car we'd rigged with cameras and to, to the zoo because he loves animals, to the venue where he did his first stand up, a gig in New York to his favorite restaurant. And we'd rigged it all with this production company I'd chosen to make it. And then I. Something went wrong with it with the visa. Nothing to do with what I was talking about a minute ago because by now I'm being completely transparent. It's all fine. But it just got held up and they, they got my passport and they wouldn't give it back to me. There was a computer failure and I couldn't get on the plane. I just couldn't get on the plane. And Ricky was already there. So we had to collapse the show. And it cost so much money to collapse the show that we couldn't get it back on its feet again. And so. And then I lost the other one as well in that process. And, and it was just a mad timing issue in the way that luck goes against you. And it was really anxiety inducing. I was like, right, sorry, hang on a minute. I've quit my job, which is a good one. I'm going to America. It's already a half baked plan. It's not like I wasn't like James Corner going, they'd host a talk show. I was just trying to get some things going and. And that fell away. And I was like, oh my God. And so that was difficult.
- [38:20]
Elizabeth Day
Did you have kids at this stage?
- [38:21]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, they were, they were nearly one and three.
- [38:23]
Elizabeth Day
Well, that is tough.
- [38:24]
Richard Bacon
Yeah.
- [38:24]
Elizabeth Day
And you had. It says here, I'm not saying this, that you had no meaningful work for a year.
- [38:29]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, pretty much, yeah.
- [38:30]
Elizabeth Day
And were you in the UK still during that or did you know?
- [38:32]
Richard Bacon
She ended up going, I rented my house. I'd already done the contract on my house, which in a cartoon world I'd rented out to Woody Harrelson. And how'd you actually. Yeah.
- [38:41]
Elizabeth Day
Oh my God.
- [38:42]
Richard Bacon
No, he's a lovely guy. We became friends through it.
- [38:44]
Elizabeth Day
Lovely.
- [38:45]
Richard Bacon
It was really sweet. He came to my house and he was like, he looked around my house and he went, hey man. He goes, I want to be friends with your friends. So I introduced him to my friends, and then I went to America and I'd see him at my friend's dinner parties.
- [38:56]
Elizabeth Day
It's like you rented out your entire life to Woody House.
- [38:58]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, I did, yeah. He's everything you would hope. He's wonderful. So I just went over there and didn't really have any work. And that was strange because I'd always worked since I was 17 and worked a lot, and so that was really strange. And then I ended up. I've got really good agents over there, caa, And I've been with them for ages now. They represent my company now. But I just, at the last minute, got a job in New York hosting a show. And actually, I was about to move back and I got that job. And then in a sort of crazy twist of fate, my first day's filming that I ever did in America was I interviewed Barack Obama, who was still the president in the dying days of his presidency. We went for a hike in Yosemite. He's still the president. That was my first day, but I had a year of not working. And then I was like, okay, we'll stay for a bit.
- [39:45]
Elizabeth Day
What was Barack Obama like?
- [39:48]
Richard Bacon
Just. I mean, I just. Like you'd expect. It was. I mean, first of all, I got a call. I got a call from the head of comms at the network that I was working for. And he went, just so you know, you're being monitored by the Secret Service. And I'd had quite a big night out out in New York the night before. And I was like. I was in a hotel room. I was looking around the room going, we're just. They weren't monitoring me last night, were they? Does it start now? When's it start? And he went. He goes, you're interviewing the president next Saturday. I was like, okay. And he landed for the interview in Marine One in his helicopter. And we walked around these redwood trees, and there were these people with machine guns tracking backwards behind us. And, yeah, I mean, I didn't. It was all so planned. I went to the White House to meet a load of his team before I even met him. I went to the, you know, the Oval Office and the Cabinet Room, stood at the door of the Situation Room. It's quite wild.
- [40:41]
Elizabeth Day
Wow. From having had no work to the epicenter of America, and they invited me there.
- [40:46]
Richard Bacon
He wasn't there when I went there. I went the White House when he wasn't there, and they were just, oh, come on, we'll show you around. It was wild. And then he was I mean, he was exactly the same. I didn't do much small talk with him in. At the beginning, his microphone broke and we. And it was just. There was a point when he was like, I had to meet him at the stream and his mic broke and the salmon had to change his mic, and Secret Service were getting nervous and we were doing this small talk. Cause it was a quick. It was very tightly choreographed. You know, he arrives, you do the interview, he leaves. But I just remember he went here, Richard, and. Cause I'd seen, like, the West Wing. He started talking, like, in the West Wing. Hello, Mr. President. And then it was. You know what? All it was was an interview about the centenary of America's Park Service.
- [41:28]
Elizabeth Day
Did he smell nice?
- [41:29]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, he smelled really nice.
- [41:30]
Elizabeth Day
Great. Okay, talk to me about work and identity. Do you think this experience was salutary for being able to separate the two? Or is work still very much who you are?
- [41:41]
Richard Bacon
What do you mean? So that. How do you mean?
- [41:43]
Elizabeth Day
So I conflate my work with my identity.
- [41:46]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, me too.
- [41:46]
Elizabeth Day
Like, who I am is my work. Yeah. And I just wondered whether this experience of not being able to work for the best part of that.
- [41:52]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, that's true. Like, who am I?
- [41:53]
Elizabeth Day
Yes. Yeah.
- [41:53]
Richard Bacon
It seems slightly humiliating. I mean, I've never. I've always been good at generating work. Like, I've just. I have. That was the year that I've done the least amount of work. I hosted one show on ITV in that year that was a failure. And by the way, if you're more fader. Quite.
- [42:08]
Elizabeth Day
What was that show? What was it called? It was called.
- [42:11]
Richard Bacon
It was called Eternal Glory. Okay. Shot in Croatia, it was. When the head of ITV eventually saw it, Peter Fincham, he said to me, he said, they told me it was going to be like the Olympics. He goes, it's more like school, sports day. Okay. No, I mean in terms of failure. I've hosted a lot of shows that you won't have heard of. Rent free, get staffed, eternal glory, sky one's the big idea, 19 keys. I mean, I've hosted a lot of TV shows that have been on network TV in primetime that you've not heard of.
- [42:52]
Elizabeth Day
Of.
- [42:53]
Richard Bacon
But the fate is. You know, it's all part of it, isn't it? It's all. It's important. It's interesting. You learn from. And it's funny. But I've always been good at generating work. And so, yeah, to come back to your point or your question, in that year, yeah, I was embarrassed. My kids started school. My older kid in that year, who's three or four, joined this lovely school in. In LA called Wagon Wheel. And I remember I was jealous of him because he had a routine. He was going to school, doing some work. All right, Putting his hand in paint, but, you know, doing some work and coming back. And I was like, oh, this is like. I was jealous because I'd never had a period of not working. And so, yes, it absolutely is my identity. I think about work all the time.
- [43:38]
Elizabeth Day
Your final failure is.
- [43:41]
Richard Bacon
I hope it's my final failure. Unlikely for this show, for the purposes of this podcast. Yes.
- [43:48]
Elizabeth Day
Is failing to beat addiction.
- [43:50]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, that's true. Yeah.
- [43:52]
Elizabeth Day
How courageous of you to choose to talk about this. I really appreciate you being this open because I think so many people will relate to it. And this is specifically to do with drink.
- [44:03]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, it is. I should have been it, really. And I. I still daydream a lot about stopping drinking. It's a very hard one because I. I like it so much, but it's caused me a lot of problems in my life. And you don't take cocaine without drinking, so if there are times when it's caused problems at home, it's certainly caused problems professionally. It's. I would have been a better host if I. If I'd gone on top of it. I don't. I don't. I'm much better now. I. I drink less now, but I still really drink more than I should, and really, I should stop. And I've been. I've been thinking about it a lot lately. There's an alcohol doctor I see, and he's really helpful. I actually take some medication each day, which means that when I have alcohol, it interacts with my brain less. Now, the simpler thing would be to just not drink at all, but it's caused me problems. And, you know, when I. When I think about, like, I like going to the gym. I really like going to the gym. I want to, and I'm in okay shape, but when I look in the mirror, I'm like, oh, why? Relative to how much work I do, why don't I look better? It's. Oh, yeah, because of how much you drink. And why didn't I sleep well last night? Oh, it's because if you drink and when you weigh up the problems that it's caused or the things it's set back or the things it's maybe not good enough at, I should have stopped. And I've been through periods of stopping. I've been through periods of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I still haven't stopped and I still like it. And that's because drinking last night and I was like, enjoying myself and I should, and I don't. I should, really, I should, I should have done by now.
- [45:41]
Elizabeth Day
I'm interested in where the should comes from. Do you, do you think you are an alcoholic?
- [45:47]
Richard Bacon
Yeah. Basically an addict. Yeah. Yeah. I've been to AA a lot of times and part of the premise is that's what you say, you know, I'm Richard and alcohol, I'm an alcoholic. And so I suppose so it's not like I can, you know, I probably won't drink today, but I'll probably drink tomorrow. I wasn't going to drink yesterday, but then the football was on, you know, it's all that kind of stuff. I, I, yes, I would say, I'm certainly saying I'm an addict and I think it's probably correlates with adhd. My grandfather, who I mentioned earlier, who wasn't very nice, died of alcoholism. My mum, you know, has a very strong relationship with alcohol. The aid when I got my ADHD diagnosis, it's a particularly strong form of it. You can see it on a brain scan. The blood flow to my prefrontal cortex is so slow. It's like there's this dark patch on my brain. And what I learned about ADHD is a lot of people with it will use alcohol or stimulants to sort of make up for the fact, even even though you don't know it at the time, that the blood flow is moving too slowly here. So there's a correlation between all of that, I think, and then I, I, the other thing is, and this is probably the wrong way to look at it, I love thinking about ideas so much. It makes me so happy. And sometimes I get more into a zone if I've had a couple of drinks. And that's a, that I think that's a dangerous way to think because then what you're telling yourself is, oh, I can only do my job if I drink. And it's not true, but sometimes it feels helpful, so. But relative to my relationship to it and problems it's caused in the past, I should have stopped.
- [47:23]
Elizabeth Day
I'm so sorry. This is a, a struggle.
- [47:27]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, I mean, it is a struggle. I mean, at the moment, I'm not causing any problems at all. I don't, I don't drink every day. I don't ever read like I'm drunk at all. I don't go out late. I'm not, so I'm, I'm not causing any problems at all, at all. But you know, I should stop.
- [47:51]
Elizabeth Day
I read something that you said about why you drink and you've explained it so well there. But you also said you don't drink to numb. You drink when you're excited and happy.
- [48:01]
Richard Bacon
Run towards, not run away from.
- [48:02]
Elizabeth Day
Yes.
- [48:03]
Richard Bacon
I remember a friend of mine saying to me, what are you running away from? I don't know. I think I'm running towards it. I think there is. If something's bothering me, if I've got bad news, if something at work is really making me anxious, which absolutely happens, I do not reach for a drink. It's just much less appealing. My danger zone is good news. I run towards and not away from.
- [48:27]
Elizabeth Day
Can we talk about your near death experience, which wasn't alcohol related, but I'm interested as to whether it had an impact on then how you thought about your relationship to addiction.
- [48:37]
Richard Bacon
It did have an impact on that for sure.
- [48:38]
Elizabeth Day
So it's 2018. It's almost like you were the patient zero of COVID because it sounds remarkable, remarkably like Covid. What you had. You ended up in a coma, in a medically induced coma because you had this respiratory issue.
- [48:53]
Richard Bacon
Yes, I did. I did and I got it. Basically it was a double lung infection. They think it was an allergic reaction to something, but no one really knew for sure. Though I was at the time trying to take some medication that actually bit like those tablets mean that you drink less and who knows if it was related to that, we just don't know. And that no one could work anything out. But it was a mystery. And it happened very quick. I don't know, but it filled up the lungs really fast. And I was in America. I was flying home for the summer. I got on the plane and I was feeling a bit weird and then the altitude meant the cabin pressure was compressing down on my lungs and that made it all worse. I didn't know what was happening at the time. I just got on a plane and was feeling weird. I was. Then I started hallucinating and I thought that people on the plane were trying to murder me. And I was so short of breath, it's surprising I didn't die on the plane. And then the plane comes in to land and the cabin pressure gets lighter because. Because you're coming into land and because the cabin pressure was reducing the lungs, I started to feel better. I could breathe a bit better. So therefore your brain goes. Like when you get over an illness, your brain goes. That's all. I'm getting better now. I'LL be right. So I was like, I mean, I had to be taken off the plane on a wheelchair, so it wasn't like that good. And I went to my mother in laws in Blackheath and, and, and I thought, maybe I'll get over it. And then it got worse again. And then my sister in law, Kirsty said, you've got to get to hospital. So I got an Uber to Lewisham. When you go to an hospital and you say you're short of breath, they take it very seriously and they move really quick. That's right. The only comic bit was at one point they said to me, oh, one of our. It's a shame. We've got a doctor who's a bit of a specialist in this stuff, but he's not here because he's on Love Island.
- [50:46]
Elizabeth Day
What was Alex.
- [50:46]
Richard Bacon
George Alex? Yeah.
- [50:48]
Elizabeth Day
Oh my gosh.
- [50:49]
Richard Bacon
Dr. Alexander. It wasn't there because he was on Love island. When I think he was becoming famous, they were like, oh no, Dr. Alex would be perfect for this. But he's on Love Island. I'm not. He's getting off with people in a hot tub instead of saving my life. And then, and then this, this consultant who saved my life called Vic. He. He just appeared in front of me and Rebecca, my wife, and he said he. They'd done a chest X ray and he's holding it and he said, we need to put you in an induced coma. And I was like, oh my God. I thought, I thought, well, I didn't take it that seriously. I was like, okay. And I seem to be like in a couple of hours. And he said, no, in 20 minutes he said to make some phone calls. So being me, I called my. I moved quick. I made a quick call to my, my sisters, my mum and dad, my wife's sisters. I moved quick. And then, and then that night I was supposed to go to the Soho House Festival and so I emailed Nick Jones, you know he is. And I was like, nick, I can't make it. He'd given me a free ticket going into a. Yeah, he's the founder of sohouse. I said, I'm going into a coma. Can you give my ticket to somebody else? And this sounds. May sound like such a twat. Another friend of mine was the chief executive Fortnum and Mason at the time in the next room. Ewan, you invented. And he'd invited me to a dinner in the boardroom and I emailed him and ewan, I can't make your game dinner in the boardroom of Fortnum Mason, because I'm going into a coma. And. And I just rattled all this off really quickly and then they just put me in a coma. And I found afterwards it had just been minutes. I mean, like four minutes or something, like all that had happened fast, fast, fast, fast, fast, gone. Then Rebecca was rubbing my feet and she. She said, don't. She said, don't walk towards the light. And then. Then I just. Then it was all chaos. I mean, they expect. They told me afterwards. And another weird story. It must have been two or three months later, I was making a documentary for ITV about immigration and about how if they fully implement Brexit, it's going to ruin immigration. And I went to the hospitals and cameras from ITV to talk to people, as in, look how many people from Europe are working in this hospital. You know, I'm anti Brexit. And. And then I saw Vic and he was like. He was talking to some students. He kind of looked slightly ashen to see me and I spoke to him and he said, no, no, because we expected you to die. It was not like you might die. I went to blood oxygen 58. If you go below 60, you know, you die or get brain damage. And I'm not dead. So there's only one other conclusion there. But it was. It was very dramatic and it was very strange. And they tried to bring me out the coma one day and I became violent and started kicking nurses and pulling cables out my neck and alarms were going off and it was really very, very strange. It's definitely made me more impatient, definitely more ambitious than I was before, more driven. It's definitely had a big impact on me in that sense. I think it's when he told me, we expected you to die, that.
- [53:58]
Elizabeth Day
That landed with me, Rebecca saying, hilariously, don't walk towards the light. Did you see a light? Was there any of that?
- [54:09]
Richard Bacon
No. I mean, when they brought me out the coma, I was just hallucinating and I remember thinking this doctor had tried to murder me. And I remember afterwards, when it was all over, making a complaint to the hospital, telling them that, just so you know, when I was in the coma, one of your nurses tried to murder me. But it wasn't like a dream. It's not like, you know that bit when you have a dream and you wake up and there's about a second where you think it was true. It was like that, but. But it was state. It was absolutely, utterly. I was convinced that Rebecca at all was also in a coma. I was convinced they'd cut half of her back away. It was all fucking mad. But the only way I can explain it is I really, really believed this stuff. Like, I really, really believed that a nurse at Lewisham Hospital who saved my life and were incredible, 40 people worked on me. I really believed and nurse tried to murder me. So when I made my complaint, I meant it. And then some years later, just a few months later, read an article in the Guardian. I see when I got into a coma and it just started by saying, and when I came out my coma, I thought a nurse had tried to murder me. And I was like, God, is this. Is this is a thing? But the hallucinations were so horrible. When they first tried to bring me out of it, I was kicking people, I was violent. I was like, if they just put me in a second coma and then. But the next time, the next time they brought me out, I was okay.
- [55:39]
Elizabeth Day
It was so destabilizing what you went through. Now, I want to quote one of my favourite lines ever in any interview and it was an Andrew Billen interview that he did with you.
- [55:49]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, I did meet with the Times. Yeah.
- [55:50]
Elizabeth Day
Yes. And it was after you recovered from this horrendous experience that came out of your coma. And he. It was this throwaway line, but it said so much. And Rebecca was there and she asked you, what do you want eat, Richard? And you said Frosties. And then Andrew Billen just notes, she returns with a bowl of Weetabix. And that to me just said so much about who she is and your dynamic.
- [56:13]
Richard Bacon
Let remember that detail.
- [56:14]
Elizabeth Day
Is she the one who is always sort of looking out for your best interests?
- [56:18]
Richard Bacon
Definitely. We're really close and I really love her. And I think being married to me has been really challenging at times for various reasons through ADHD addiction, who I am. But we are a really close couple and in a way we're closer than we've ever been. And sometimes I think about when I've been annoying, I think about God, why? Where's the gratitude towards her? The way she sat in the hospital in those waiting rooms sometimes with my parents trying to manage the kids, kind of thinking, it looks like the hospital are talking to me in a way which makes me think he might actually die, leaving her with a God. How old were they? You know, four and six year old, I think. And she went through a lot. I guess what I'm pleased about is there's something in my nature. And you look at the kid who got fired off Blue Peter for that kind of behavior and who I am and I'VE had a really fun. My 30s were so fun, but also chaotic. I'm not really the sort of person that I would, if I look at me from over here, would expect to stay married. I think my sort of nature would be, you love a couple of marriages. And I don't think I will. I just don't think I will. I don't think, you know, this only ends if she leaves me. And we met at Capitol Radio, where I hosted the Drive Time show, and she was head of marketing, and. And we fell in love very quickly, as you often do when you. You know, to the person you marry. And it was so exciting. And I still feel that way about her now. And. And I would say. I would say right now. Whereas, I mean, she might tell a different story. She's going to have a slightly different perspective on me because she's not chaotic, you know, so for her, she will always look at me with a little bit of caution because of that, whereas I don't need to look at her with caution because she's steady. But I just love her very much. And I think when I got that ADHD diagnosis, it was in Orange county at a place called the Amen Clinic, which is pretty much the number one. Daniel Amen is more or less the number one specialist in adhd. And they put my brain scan on one of those light boxes, and you could just see this dark patch at the front because the blood flow was so slow. And he looked at it and he. And even he was kind of shocked. And I thought, God, this. I'm in an adh. I'm in clinic for this thing. And he's shocked. And he looked at Rebecca and he put his hand on her shoulder and he said, this woman is keeping you alive. And that isn't why I love her, and it isn't why I'm in love with her. But I also think it's true.
- [58:48]
Elizabeth Day
That was so beautiful and sincere, and I could go on talking to you for hours. I really, really love the way that you think about failure and success. And thank you so much for sharing what you have with us today.
- [59:06]
Richard Bacon
Yeah, thanks. I've really enjoyed it. You know, you're. You're a particularly good interviewer, and it's. You're very much good. You give people space to talk. And it's. It's quite useful, this sort of thing. There's an element of therapy to conversations like this. It actually does have an immediate impact on you in the present because you've spoken about it. You know, I'll walk out of here and think a bit more about it and I'll think a bit more about what I need to adjust and how I can be better and. And what I'm grateful for. So, you know, it's been a. It's been a. A useful conversation, to be honest. I've really enjoyed it and I think it's for. Just selfishly, I think it's been quite an important conversation.
- [59:43]
Elizabeth Day
Thank you so much. It's an honor to be part of it. Go tell Rebecca you love her. I will.
- [59:49]
Richard Bacon
I do. I do it too much and annoys her.
- [59:55]
Elizabeth Day
Thank you so much for listening and watching. This episode has been brought to you by Dove Whole Body Deodorant. Please do follow how to fail to get new episodes as they land on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. Please tell all your friends this is an Elizabeth Day and Sony Music Entertainment original podcast. Thank you so much for listening. The Internet gives us a glimpse into the crazy happening all around us. Unhinged behavior, personal secrets, unbelievable coincidences. It's all one big circus. And the RR show is your front row seat. Each week we curate the wildest Reddit stories just for you. Whether you're into hilarious accidents, insane relationship drama, or pure chaos, these insane confessions are sure to make your jaw drop. Listen to the RR show weekly on Mondays via your favorite podcast platform, or get your episodes early and ad free by becoming a member. The RR Show. All of the drama, none of the hassle.